When Greeks and Turks Meet: Interdisciplinary Perspectives on the Relationship Since 1923 ed. by Vally Lytra (review)

Book Reviews 385 Nazi planners seems like verbal gymnastics premised on the necessity of locating the emulation of Turkey within the larger frame of T T Nazi ideology. Further research is needed to tease out this vital issue. Atatürk in the Nazi Imagination weighs in on the on-going debate over Nazis as modern or reactionary. Like any study about one group constructing an understanding of self from their view of another, the Nazi vision of Atatürk suggests that the “Nazi self” understood itself as modern. The Nazi planners saw the New Turkey as a vibrant and “hypermodern” state. “ T T A crucial aspect A of the Nazi’s New Turkey was the propagandistic preparation and support for T T an absolute Führer state and all the other things to come—from various aspects RIY|ONLVFK Aufbau to a ‘solution’ of the ‘minority question’ and ultimate war” (p. 225). While the role of the Armenian genocide in the Nazi vision of Turkey T T was not a central focus of this monograph, Ihrig investigates this key connection in his 2016 Justifying Genocide: Germany and the Armenians from Bismarck to Hitler ( r Harvard University Press). Ihrig also calls for a reconsideration of the current historiography of Turkey’s role in the T T Second World War. :KLOH,KULJSDVVLRQDWHO\DUJXHVWKDWWKH1D]L¶VSHWUL¿HGYLVLRQRI7XUNH\KDG OLWWOHWRGRZLWKWKHOLYHGH[SHULHQFHVDQGDWWLWXGHVLQ7XUNH\$QNDUD¶VÀLUWDtion with Pan-Turanism in the 1940s and exports of chromium during the war T T suggests that Turkey was not as neutral as T T Turkish historiography currently T T maintains (pp. 214–17). Through his investigation of how Nazis perceived and portrayed the construction of the Turkish T T Republic, Ihrig sought “to change the way we view National Socialism itself” (p. 6). Utilizing a transnational model WRH[SORUHKRZLGHDVIURPRQHSODFHZHUHPRGL¿HGDQGWDNHQXSLQDQRWKHU Ihrig realized his goal. This is no small accomplishment. Brian JK Miller Allegheny College doi:10.2979/jottturstuass.3.2.12 Vally Lytra, ed. When Greeks and Turks Meet: Interdisciplinary Perspectives on the Relationship Since 1923. London and New York: Routledge, 2016. 319 pp. Cloth, $134.95. ISBN: 978-1409446019. The cycle of Greek-Turkish rapprochement opened in the late 1990s has had a very tangible impact on the production of scholarship in both countries towards a shift from mutually exclusive narratives to comparative approaches. In the previous two decades, enough scholars have entered the IUD\WRGHVFULEHWKHLUZRUNDVDGLVWLQFWDQGHYROYLQJ³¿HOG´RI*UHHN7XUNLVK studies. Hence, it is not a surprise that the turn of the century saw the publication of numerous edited volumes, the very existence and content of which has captured and shaped a tangible moment in regional historiography: that 386 Journal of the Ottoman and Turkish Studies Association, Vol. 3.2 of “comparative” studies. Indicatively, one could consider Gondicas and Issawi (1999); Kollias et al. (2003); Dragonas and Birtek (2005); Tsitselikis   g]NÕUÕPOÕ DQG 6RIRV   %DUXK DQG .HFKULRWLV   DQG Fortna et al. (2013). The reviewed volume, however, overlaps with the potential closure of the above-described cycle. Recent developments in the region may well signal the end of the Greek-Turkish rapprochement with unknown implications on T T the resulting scholarship. In this sense, the timing of the reviewed publication in and of itself raises some broader questions regarding the very existence of WKH¿HOGLWVFRQQHFWLRQWRWKHODUJHUSROLWLFDOVRFLRHFRQRPLFFRQWH[WDQGLWV resulting impact, strengths, and limitations. Right from the title, editor Vally Lytra alludes to the existence of an intimate (albeit turbulent) “relationship” L L between the two countries and their respective peoples: a type of mingling WKDWFKDUDFWHUL]HVERWKWKHZRUNDQGLQGLYLGXDOSUR¿OHRIVRPHFRQWULEXWRUV Aside from this general theme sounded throughout the volume, the included essays are quite diverse in terms of depth, scope, goals, and methodology. It also does not escape attention that Turkish scholars are underrepresented. T T Given that there is a booming literature on the discussed issues in Turkey T T and...